


Rebellion

by darwinzfinchez



Series: The Wolf Cub [1]
Category: Spartacus Series (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-12
Updated: 2014-10-12
Packaged: 2018-02-20 22:43:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,253
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2445869
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/darwinzfinchez/pseuds/darwinzfinchez
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A story told from the point of view of a little girl freed from slavery in the rebellion, who is adopted by a female warrior (Original Character) and grows close to Agron and Nasir. Broadly canon-compliant (ish) with spoilers all the way up to War of The Damned: Episode Ten. Rated M for violence and swearing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Rebellion

**Author's Note:**

> I'm new to AO3 and not sure about all the tagging and trigger warning systems. Please let me know if there are any tags or warnings that I've forgotten about.

In my short life, I have known two mothers and two fathers, but never the traditional mother-father combination. At least, not that I can remember.  
The first parent I remember was perhaps my true mother, the woman who grew me in her womb and brought me into the world. I remember little of her, having been very small when she was forcibly ripped from me. She had dark hair, almost black, like my own, though this is not enough to suppose us bound by blood. I think that she had blue eyes, like me, as well, and know that she shared my pale skin. I think.  
My memories of her are all of being held in dark places, my hair stroked, encouraged to quiet, so as not to anger the big men who strode among us carrying whips and bludgeons, dealing out blows to those who could not remain silent. Then, when the slavers’ caravan in which we were being transported was attacked, she dragged me out of the cart with her, to escape the guard who had decided to start butchering the slaves who remained therein, convinced that we had something to do with the rebels who had attacked us.  
Having freed me from my manacles before herself, she bid me hide under the cart, and was going to join me, but suddenly changed her mind.  
“Stay there!” she cried. “Do not move, Elena, until I come to find you!” I was forced to break my silent promise, since she did not come to find me.  
Another woman did, though when she first threw herself under the cart and reached for me, I did not recognise her as such. She seemed to me like a wild thing, a violent savage. A man, in other words. (My harsh assessment of men as a sex had been borne of bitter experience.) But when I huddled away from her, whimpering in terror, she lowered her voice and, as my eyes adjusted to the dark, I saw the outline of her, distinctly female, face, and the curve of her body which again spoke to her comforting femaleness. This brought me down sufficiently from my pitch of terror that I could hear her voice as she spoke my name:  
“Elena, you are safe. The fighting is over. Come out. Please.”  
I never found out how she knew my name. By the time it occurred to me to ask, I was many years older and she was long dead. Perhaps she spoke with my mother, who told her my name, perhaps she only overheard it when my mother shouted to me. However she knew it, it was enough to coax me out from my hiding place. I did not like it under there, huddled in the dark, able to hear the sounds of fighting and killing on all sides. The skirmish was over, and the clearing was far more quiet now.  
When I emerged, blinking, into the light, a loud male voice expressed disgust at my appearance.  
“A child! What are we to do with a fucking child!”  
My eyes still dazzled by the sunlight, I could not make out the man who spoke – he seemed only a gigantic, threatening mass looming over me. I hid behind the strange woman who had coaxed me out. This inauspicious meeting was how I first met Agron.  
“Protect her. Feed her.”  
“Another fucking mouth to feed!”  
“How much could such a tiny thing eat?” This was spoken by another male voice, belonging to a smaller man who I could just make out by Agron’s side. He had long hair, like a woman, and smiled kindly at me, yet still I shrank from him. Nasir.  
“She will come with us.” Another man. There were so many of them. I clung to the woman who had found me, determined not to let her go, until I found my mother.  
Agron, though I did not know his name back then, turned to this new man.  
“We have not enough fighting men to protect so many who are vulnerable. The price of being a rebel slave is high, we cannot have a child pay it.”  
“Then we shall protect her from it.” the woman said. I looked up at her. She had yellow hair, braided back tightly from her face. Her features were handsome, rather than pretty. She wore strips of ragged cloth bound tightly round her body, and carried a sword in one hand. It was bloody. The men all held swords too. I was afraid. I wanted my mother.  
“Does she have a mother?” Agron asked.  
“There was but one female slave in the caravan. And…” Nasir looked back, over his shoulder. Agron and the woman’s gazes followed his. They did not speak, and I could not see what they were looking at.  
“We must away.” Agron said abruptly. “And quietly.” he looked down at me as he said this.  
We began to walk, and the adults around me bunched so as to hide something from my view. I had a child’s instinct to know when something was being kept from me, and when I should go after it. I wriggled out of the hold the woman had on my hand, and dodged the others’ attempts to hold me back. On evading them, I was faced with the sight of my mother lying lifeless on the ground, her throat cut so deep her head was nearly severed from shoulders.  
“NOOOOOOOO!” I wailed. “MAMAAAAAAAAAAA!”  
Agron reached for me, but was beaten to it by the yellow haired woman, who efficiently clamped one hand across my mouth to silence me, the other round my middle to lift me up and remove me from the clearing. I squirmed and kicked in vain – her grip was like iron. When I finally stopped struggling, we had walked yards, in the company of Agron and Nasir.  
“She howls to rival the Wolf of Capua.” Agron grinned.  
“Do not mock her when she has just lost her mother.” Nasir chided.  
“All of us have lost loved ones. If we cannot mock the grieving, we can mock no one.”

The Wolf of Capua was the woman who had rescued me. A freewoman of Rome, she had wandered the streets of Capua since childhood, absent parents or the memory of them, or even memory of her own name. She was christened the Wolf by Agron when she used her capacity to imitate a wolf’s cry – to great effect – to distract a force of Romans and allow her fellow rebels to attack them. Liking the title better than the names she had been called previously, such as Bitch, Cunt, and Whore, she adopted Lupa as her name.  
I remember dimly living with her in a succession of villas and abandoned buildings – I am told that one of them was a temple on the slopes of Vesuvius. I followed her around all day, and at night slept by her side, under her coat. I remained terrified of Agron, though Lupa told me that he could be trusted, and he affectionately called me Cub. He seemed singly unconcerned by my terror of him.  
Nasir, on the other hand, tried to win me over. He spoke softly and kindly to me, offered me food and to tell me stories – Lupa knew no children’s stories, having had no one to tell them to her. Yet I would only suffer Nasir to tell me stories if I sat in Lupa’s lap while he told them, and I always huddled into her chest, avoiding his gaze even as it sought mine. Then he left – to go to the mines and rescue a woman I had never met, and I remained with Lupa and Agron.  
I missed him, and his stories. Lupa tried to tell them to me, but it wasn’t the same. And Agron, with his mood even darker than before, seemed more terrifying than ever. My step faltered, on our way to Vesuvius, and Agron reached out a hand to hold me up. I started away from him and fell, and whimpered in fear when he attempted to help me up. He withdrew instantly, his hands outstretched: I will not hurt you, I will not touch you.  
“Apologies.” he said, and looked up to ensure that Lupa drew near. When she reached out to pull me to my feet, he withdrew, satisfied that I was cared for. A seed of trust was planted somewhere in my mind, and would grow.  
Nasir returned, pale and sick, so sick in fact that he fell to a kind of sleep, though I knew that it was not a usual sleep. People who are asleep twitch their limbs as they dream, and may be roused by a sudden noise, but Nasir was still as a stone, save for the gentle movement of his chest with his breathing. I was morbidly fascinated by his near-lifeless state, and made one of my rare ventures from Lupa’s side that I might visit the sick room and see him. Though still a man, he was less frightening when in this state. I felt almost sad that he was not awake enough to speak to me. Until, that is, he stirred while I was within his room, and his bleary gaze fell upon me.  
“Hello.” he whispered, and I fled. I was too terrified even to tell Lupa what had me so afraid, but it did not matter, since he emerged and made himself known. Once the initial shock had receded, I was less afraid of him, and would even allow him to speak to me absent Lupa’s company.

Time passed, and I grew bolder. The men around me treated me as, at best, an amusing pet, and at worst, as a nuisance. I could avoid the blows and harsh words which had been inevitable in my prior life as a slave, if I only refrained from shouting while people slept, and crashing into people while running round like a mad thing, as children are wont to do. I grew positively trusting of Nasir, and even of Agron, who smiled more, now that Nasir was recovered. Sometimes, when in especially good mood, Agron would lift me off my feet and throw me into the air, laughing joyfully at the sensation of falling, only to be caught again in his strong arms. I do not think he realised then that he was earning my eternal love and loyalty. The rebellion grew, too big to be held by a villa or temple, and I grew used to sleeping in a tent – again, with Lupa always at my side. Children began to appear in the camp, and I had company my own age. Sometimes, Lupa and the others – the fighting men and women – would leave, to fight in battles, and some of them would not return. Though other children of my acquaintance lost parents in these “battles” which existed as but an abstract concept in my mind, it never occurred to me that the Wolf of Capua could fall.  
To me, it seemed that it was when we once more began to live in buildings that it all fell apart. When we first walked in to Sinuessa en Valle, I caught sight of a pile of corpses as we entered the city, including that of a young girl my age, a toy still clutched in her fist. I stopped, struck dumb with horror, and Lupa hurried me past.  
Everything changed after that. Agron grew angry and curt, and had no more time for me. Nasir was sad and withdrawn, and similarly distracted. Lupa was exhausted, and too busy to play with me. Sometimes I had to sleep alone because she was on guard duty. I never slept until she returned.  
Then, all of a sudden, we were leaving, with very little warning. I had few possessions – only clothes, which I was hastily dressed in before being bundled out the door, and out the city gate. After losing Lupa once in the crowd, I demanded to be carried, and she complied, though with a very bad grace.  
Then we gained Melior Ridge. I remember very little detail of the times when I was happy in the rebel camp, though this time accounts for perhaps two years of my life. Yet everything about Melior Ridge stands out, pin-sharp. The bitterness of the cold, though Lupa wrapped me in her furs as well as my own, and huddled me as close to the fire as she could. The harsh wind, which terrified me as it threatened to pull our tent from its mooring, and the life from our bodies. And the storm, which raged for a day and a night, and claimed over a thousand lives by the end.  
Something changed after the storm – something in the air. I was yet half asleep when Agron himself passed by me and Lupa to tell us we were to prepare to move that night.  
“The Cub yet lives!” he exclaimed, seeing my small face peering out from Lupa’s cloak. I yawned at him and turned my head back to Lupa’s chest, to resume my sleep, yet still I heard him speak in a low voice to her.  
“Bind this about her eyes before you approach the trench. It is not a sight for a child.”  
“She has seen much already.”  
“Too much. Do not let her see more.”  
I heard, dimly, the sounds of fighting from far off – at the fortified trench which blocked our exit from the pass. I put my hands over my ears to block out the sound, and fell again to sleep, until being gently woken by Lupa, who was binding cloth around my eyes. A blindfold.  
“Why?” I asked.  
“That you might continue sleep in the morning light, as I carry you.”  
I yawned and complied, submitting to being carried until we crossed the trench and gained the wall. But I was growing restless, and soon after demanded to be put down, that I might walk by myself. Or run around and play with the other children, as the mood might take me.  
Things returned almost to normal, for a time. Until many of our number, including Agron, left abruptly. I had been told nothing of what was happening, and was wandering the camp looking for Agron when I came across Nasir.  
“Where is Agron?” I asked.  
“Gone. To fight with Crixus.”  
“Why did you not go with him?” I asked, surprised. Since meeting the two men, I had rarely seen them separated for more than a few hours. They were often huddled together in intimate conversation. Nasir’s expression darkened.  
“Fall from sight.” he snapped, and stalked off to shout at a young recruit. I was offended, and threw a lump of mud at his back, which he did not seem to notice.  
Agron returned, and was much changed. He was bruised and bloodied, which was hardly a change – everyone is injured in battle. The change was within – in his eyes which stared at me blankly, absent recognition, for endless moments before he recognised me and greeted me with an absent minded: “Hello, Cub.” More often than not, he stared off morosely into space, roused from his reverie only by the touch of Nasir, who was almost back to his old self. On the eve of what would prove to be the final battle, Nasir came across me wandering the camp when I should have been abed, and chivvied me to Lupa’s tent.  
“Tell me a story.” I demanded.  
“I have told you many stories over the years, you tell one to me.” he retorted.  
Hesitantly, I recounted the story of Romulus and Remus, raised by a wolf. “Like me!” I exclaimed, as was my habit, and Nasir laughed as if he had not heard the quip many times before. When I was finished, he reached out his arms and I embraced him without hesitation.  
“So different from the frightened little thing I first met.” he sighed. He unwrapped his arms from me, and held me at arms length. “Listen to me, cub. I do not think that we shall meet again.” He was wrong. “Tomorrow, you and Lupa are for the Alps, with the other women and children. I am for battle, and…” he hesitated. “I am not likely to return. You will remain with Lupa.” Wrong again. “Be good for her, and look after her.”  
“I shall.” I said seriously.  
“Good.” he kissed the top of my head. “Now sleep. You have a busy day ahead of you tomorrow.” He was right.

The plan, I now know, was for the army of fighting men and women to provide diversion, to allow the old and sick, the women and children, to make their way across the Alps, with only a small guard to keep them safe from any stray Romans we may come across. But Crassus predicted this and, dissatisfied with merely defeating Spartacus in battle, decided to assign a small force of Romans to ensure that the women and children attempting to flee over the alps were captured and butchered as well.  
They fell upon us when I was walking with Lupa at the head of our procession. Seeing them, or sensing them (I did not have chance to ask) Lupa bid me hide before shouting over her shoulder “Romans!” and drawing her sword. I obeyed her, crawling into the undergrowth and covering my eyes and ears to shield myself from the sight and sound of battle, which I kept trying to forget, only to have my memory brutally refreshed.  
“Now I have you, you little bitch!” a Roman soldier snarled, dragging me out by my hair. I yelled and twisted in his grasp, more concerned with the fact that he was pulling my hair than the fact that he was raising his sword to cut off my head.  
“NO!” Lupa turned from the Roman she was already fighting, to barge into the one who held me. She sank her sword into his side, and the two of us were sprayed liberally with blood. I was soaked from head to toe, but the soldier’s hand released my hair, and the sword which had been seconds from taking my life clattered useless to the ground.  
To save me, Lupa had left her back unprotected. I did not see the sword enter her back, but I saw it protrude from between her breasts. Her eyes went blank, and she slumped onto her front, the ghost of her last word still on her lips: “Run.”  
I obeyed. The soldier who had killed Lupa pursued me, but tripped on a root, and was called back by his commander: “Do not desert your post to pursue one brat! There are plenty still here!” I ran until my lungs burned, and my feet were cut up and bloodied, and then I kept running. I ran until the sound of voices gave me pause. They were speaking the only language I understood – Latin. But that was the language Romans spoke. Another tongue reached my ears. The one Agron sometimes spoke with the other Germans. A barbarian tongue, spoken by no self respecting Roman soldier. I drew closer, and looked at the speakers from behind a tree. I recognised the woman whose red hair I had stared at since she joined the rebel camp. This was the other group of non-combatants. I walked towards the path, causing quite the panic as they heard my approach.  
“What is that? A Roman Scout!”  
“Look – he wears red, a Roman cloak!”  
I stepped out onto the path, greeted by mingled hilarity and horror.  
“All this panic, and it is but a child!”  
“My god, what have they done to her!”  
The woman with the red hair knelt before me.  
“Are you hurt?”  
I was more badly hurt than I had ever been, but it was an inner wound, not one that bled, and that was what she meant, so I shook my head.  
“How did you come to be so covered in blood?”  
“Roman blood.” I said dully.  
Someone laughed. “This is a story for the ages! A child who slaughters Roman soldiers and bathes in their blood.”  
“No!” Then I started to cry, and the red headed woman shushed the man who had spoken, and took me to a stream to wash the worst of the blood off me. There was only so much plain water could do to remove blood from my skin absent soap, and my clothes would likely remain always a dull red-brown. The urgency of my need to run had distracted me from the pain in my feet, and the woman had to remove several thorns and splinters of wood from my bare feet. I grunted and even swore when she removed them, but would not cry. I would not waste tears on splinters when Lupa was dead.  
A miracle occurred, at least as far as I was concerned. We were climbing a hill when a lookout ahead sighted riders.  
“Two. Not wearing Roman cloaks.”  
“They could be Roman soldiers in disguise.”  
Curious, I went to stand by the man who had spotted them, and squinted down into the valley. I recognised the dark skin and the fall of black hair of one of the riders.  
“Nasir!” I exclaimed. “And Agron!” There was a murmur among the people behind me.  
“Could it be?”  
“How could they have wandered so far from field of battle?”  
I did not care, but started to scramble down the hill towards them.  
“Agron! AgronAgron! Nasir! NASIR!” They could not hear me. I stopped, and narrowed my eyes at them. They were about to bypass us – they would soon begin to draw further away from us. Suddenly inspired, I did a poor – but carrying – impression of Lupa’s wolf howl.  
“Ow-ow-awooo!”  
If my howl had been as good as Lupa’s, they would have urged their horses on, thinking that a pack of wolves lingered in the valley to attack them. Since it was so poor, they stopped their horses and peered in my direction, shading their eyes, to see why there was a child wandering the Alps doing impressions of wolves. I jumped up and down, waving my arms.  
“Agron! Nasir!”  
Someone else – a grown man, more visible than I – joined me.  
“Agron! Nasir!” He waved a piece of white cloth. Seeing it, they turned their horses towards us, and urged them towards the crest of the hill where we all stood.  
“They have something with them.” the sharp-eyed man said, as they drew a little nearer.  
“A body.”  
It was not a body, but a man yet living. Spartacus, with whom I had exchanged few words, whose lofty position did not impress me, yet I did not want to watch him die. I hovered nearby, wondering if Agron or Nasir would notice me, but they were occupied in laying out their friend and attempting to rouse him. I drew back, recognising, with uncharacteristic maturity, that they needed this time with him more than I needed it with them. I sat at a distance, suddenly feeling tiredness from my day’s walk and rapid flight from the Romans. I overheard a conversation about how many non combatants had been lost.  
“Only one survived from the other group. A child, she ran from the massacre and came upon us soaked with Roman blood but unhurt.”  
“A child?” Nasir frowned, and looked up. “Who-“ but then Spartacus woke, and all else was forgotten. I saw, from a distance, that Agron and Nasir knelt by the dying man and spoke with him for a few moments. Then, after a short silence, Agron leaned forward and kissed his forehead, and reached out a comforting hand to Nasir, whose head was bowed in grief.  
They set to building a cairn to hide the body before we moved on, and I noticed, for the first time, that Agron could not help as much as he usually would. He tried, but dropped several large rocks, coming very close to breaking his feet, and Nasir gently bid him stand back and let those more able do the work.  
While he stood reluctantly idle, I cautiously approached him.  
“Agron?”  
He turned and saw me, and started.  
“Jupiter’s Cock! What happened to you?”  
“Romans came upon us. Lupa killed the one who held me, and I was covered in his blood. Then I ran.”  
“Fuck! And what of the wolf? Is she yet of this world?”  
I opened my mouth to say “No.” but the words would not come. My lip trembled and I began to shake.  
“Wait. Wait, hush.” Agron knelt by me and pulled me to him, though his fingers could not grip me and merely rested on my back and head. “You are safe, and whole, and that is all that the Wolf really wanted. In the afterlife, now, she is happy. That you are alive.”  
I put my arms around him.  
“Is Spartacus happy? In the afterlife?”  
“He is reunited with his wife, which was his greatest desire.”  
“Are we unlucky, then, to be left alive?”  
Agron gave a short laugh, and released me, straightening up.  
“It may feel so, yet we are not. In time, we may yet believe it.”

He lingered, once the cairn was built. The sword and shield crafted by Nasir rested upon it. And Nasir had to reach for him, tug on his shoulder. Leave the past behind. This way, lies our future.


End file.
